Tour Championship Ratings: NBC Has Tiger in Tank

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NBC said household ratings for its coverage of the final round of The Tour Championship golf tournament Sunday were up 233%.

No, that is not a misprint -- it is instead the imprint of Tiger Woods on the sport's TV ratings.

OK, it was also the final tournament in the inaugural FedExCup, where a $10 million annuity went to the winner of the season-long points battle.

Woods won the tournament handily, flirting with a tour record-low four-round total and setting a personal best in that department. Last year's winner, by contrast, was Australian Adam Scott -- popular, but no Tiger.

NBC averaged a 3 rating Sunday compared with a 0.9 rating on the final day of the 2006 tournament. The network said its two-day rating average for the weekend coverage was up 155%.

John Eggerton
John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.